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Experiments with Alternate Currents of High Potential and High Frequency
This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it.
This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.
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We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.
Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface.
We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
120 pages, Paperback
First published November 30, 1896
142 people are currently reading
1578 people want to read
About the author
Nikola Tesla
360 books1,429 followersNikola Tesla was a Serbian-American inventor, electrical engineer, mechanical engineer, and futurist. He is best known for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current (AC) electricity supply system.
Born and raised in the Austrian Empire, Tesla first studied engineering and physics in the 1870s without receiving a degree. He then gained practical experience in the early 1880s working in telephony and at Continental Edison in the new electric power industry. In 1884 he emigrated to the United States, where he became a naturalized citizen. He worked for a short time at the Edison Machine Works in New York City before he struck out on his own. With the help of partners to finance and market his ideas, Tesla set up laboratories and companies in New York to develop a range of electrical and mechanical devices. His AC induction motor and related polyphase AC patents, licensed by Westinghouse Electric in 1888, earned him a considerable amount of money and became the cornerstone of the polyphase system which that company eventually marketed.
Attempting to develop inventions he could patent and market, Tesla conducted a range of experiments with mechanical oscillators/generators, electrical discharge tubes, and early X-ray imaging. He also built a wirelessly controlled boat, one of the first ever exhibited. Tesla became well known as an inventor and demonstrated his achievements to celebrities and wealthy patrons at his lab, and was noted for his showmanship at public lectures. Throughout the 1890s, Tesla pursued his ideas for wireless lighting and worldwide wireless electric power distribution in his high-voltage, high-frequency power experiments in New York and Colorado Springs. In 1893, he made pronouncements on the possibility of wireless communication with his devices. Tesla tried to put these ideas to practical use in his unfinished Wardenclyffe Tower project, an intercontinental wireless communication and power transmitter, but ran out of funding before he could complete it.
After Wardenclyffe, Tesla experimented with a series of inventions in the 1910s and 1920s with varying degrees of success. Having spent most of his money, Tesla lived in a series of New York hotels, leaving behind unpaid bills. He died in New York City in January 1943. Tesla's work fell into relative obscurity following his death, until 1960, when the General Conference on Weights and Measures named the International System of Units (SI) measurement of magnetic flux density the tesla in his honor. There has been a resurgence in popular interest in Tesla since the 1990s.
Born and raised in the Austrian Empire, Tesla first studied engineering and physics in the 1870s without receiving a degree. He then gained practical experience in the early 1880s working in telephony and at Continental Edison in the new electric power industry. In 1884 he emigrated to the United States, where he became a naturalized citizen. He worked for a short time at the Edison Machine Works in New York City before he struck out on his own. With the help of partners to finance and market his ideas, Tesla set up laboratories and companies in New York to develop a range of electrical and mechanical devices. His AC induction motor and related polyphase AC patents, licensed by Westinghouse Electric in 1888, earned him a considerable amount of money and became the cornerstone of the polyphase system which that company eventually marketed.
Attempting to develop inventions he could patent and market, Tesla conducted a range of experiments with mechanical oscillators/generators, electrical discharge tubes, and early X-ray imaging. He also built a wirelessly controlled boat, one of the first ever exhibited. Tesla became well known as an inventor and demonstrated his achievements to celebrities and wealthy patrons at his lab, and was noted for his showmanship at public lectures. Throughout the 1890s, Tesla pursued his ideas for wireless lighting and worldwide wireless electric power distribution in his high-voltage, high-frequency power experiments in New York and Colorado Springs. In 1893, he made pronouncements on the possibility of wireless communication with his devices. Tesla tried to put these ideas to practical use in his unfinished Wardenclyffe Tower project, an intercontinental wireless communication and power transmitter, but ran out of funding before he could complete it.
After Wardenclyffe, Tesla experimented with a series of inventions in the 1910s and 1920s with varying degrees of success. Having spent most of his money, Tesla lived in a series of New York hotels, leaving behind unpaid bills. He died in New York City in January 1943. Tesla's work fell into relative obscurity following his death, until 1960, when the General Conference on Weights and Measures named the International System of Units (SI) measurement of magnetic flux density the tesla in his honor. There has been a resurgence in popular interest in Tesla since the 1990s.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
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August 10, 2014This guy makes me feel like a lazy idiot.
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July 10, 2014Free download available at Project Gutenberg.
July 25, 2018
This book is missing the figures. You can't understand the book without the figures. Basically worthless.
This book is a classic, but the figures were not included making this electronic version worthless. Please add the figures and provide to those who have already paid for a complete copy.
This book is a classic, but the figures were not included making this electronic version worthless. Please add the figures and provide to those who have already paid for a complete copy.
September 14, 2024
I absolutely love all things Tesla.
He is such a familiar name, and, as of late, we have made him into both a Kook, and a mythic figure who figured out the secrets of the Universe and, had all those secrets taken, and hidden away, used by the powers that be, while all we common folks lived on coal dust and ice, cold, hope.
Where is the truth in it?
Certainly he is a man who was greatly responsible for the state of the modern world. One of many, to be sure, but, explore those pivotal figures, they are almost always people who had been, "Inspired", and, Tesla points out, quite starkly, in many of his writings, just how inspiration came to him, just how he, very literally, "Saw", aspects of his science.
Because of this, and, because of what he brought to the world, I've met some who believe that that which influenced him was contrary to the well being of man.
In most cases (All of the ones I'm familiar with), they see man's place as a kind of "Steward" of the earth, and, desire man to live in a pastoral setting, where horses and hoes, axes and adzes, and sailing ships, are the high tech advantages we have, and,
electricity, in particular, is one of the great wrongs.
Tesla as a Prometheus. How about that for a twist?
Read his writings, though, and also see a man of his times, who was riding a wave that was circling the earth.
Yes, was he "First," before Marconi?
Did he "outdo" Edison, on A.C. versus, D.C.?
Did he come up with the concept of cruise missiles, cell phones, broadcast power, the spark gap?
Did he think aliens were communication with us, and on and on.
Crack pot, genius, or, Prometheus.
Why not all of the above, as any great mind often is, and, just to think someone is a Kook because their invention / process / philosophy / theory, and on and on, has not yet been found to be the absolute most obvious, truth,
Yet.
That is the way of man,
That we believe the sun revolves around the earth until...
it, doesn't.
He is such a familiar name, and, as of late, we have made him into both a Kook, and a mythic figure who figured out the secrets of the Universe and, had all those secrets taken, and hidden away, used by the powers that be, while all we common folks lived on coal dust and ice, cold, hope.
Where is the truth in it?
Certainly he is a man who was greatly responsible for the state of the modern world. One of many, to be sure, but, explore those pivotal figures, they are almost always people who had been, "Inspired", and, Tesla points out, quite starkly, in many of his writings, just how inspiration came to him, just how he, very literally, "Saw", aspects of his science.
Because of this, and, because of what he brought to the world, I've met some who believe that that which influenced him was contrary to the well being of man.
In most cases (All of the ones I'm familiar with), they see man's place as a kind of "Steward" of the earth, and, desire man to live in a pastoral setting, where horses and hoes, axes and adzes, and sailing ships, are the high tech advantages we have, and,
electricity, in particular, is one of the great wrongs.
Tesla as a Prometheus. How about that for a twist?
Read his writings, though, and also see a man of his times, who was riding a wave that was circling the earth.
Yes, was he "First," before Marconi?
Did he "outdo" Edison, on A.C. versus, D.C.?
Did he come up with the concept of cruise missiles, cell phones, broadcast power, the spark gap?
Did he think aliens were communication with us, and on and on.
Crack pot, genius, or, Prometheus.
Why not all of the above, as any great mind often is, and, just to think someone is a Kook because their invention / process / philosophy / theory, and on and on, has not yet been found to be the absolute most obvious, truth,
Yet.
That is the way of man,
That we believe the sun revolves around the earth until...
it, doesn't.
Want to read
April 11, 2023Mr. tesla is only 35 years of age. He is tall and spare with a clean-cut, thin, refined face, and eyes that recall all the stories one has read of keenness of vision and phenomenal ability to see through things. He is an omnivorous reader, who never forgets; and he possesses the peculiar facility in languages that enables the least educated native of eastern Europe to talk and write in at least half a dozen tongues. A more congenial companion cannot be desired for the hours when one " pours out heart affluence in discursive talk," and when the conversation, dealing at first with things near at hand and next to us, reaches out and rises to the greater questions of life, duty and destiny.
I take hold of it; I bring my body in contact with a wire
Experiment- here is a simple glass from which the air has been partially exhausted. I take hold of it; I bring my body in contact with a wire conveying alternating currents of high potential, and the tube in my hand is brilliantly lighted. In whatever position I may put it, wherever I may move it in space, as far as I can reach, its soft, pleasing light persists with undiminished brightness.
I take hold of it; I bring my body in contact with a wire
Experiment- here is a simple glass from which the air has been partially exhausted. I take hold of it; I bring my body in contact with a wire conveying alternating currents of high potential, and the tube in my hand is brilliantly lighted. In whatever position I may put it, wherever I may move it in space, as far as I can reach, its soft, pleasing light persists with undiminished brightness.
October 31, 2020
I read both version, lecture and original version. I dont know about technologies in that time, but from what i read here, this is still experiments and no actual cases released yet (at that time). Just amazed with how detail this document is, and i dont know if this document a classified files or not in that time.
April 19, 2022
Keep in mind this is a scientific paper, a transcription of a demonstration, so the appeal is limited. Tesla was a genius.
May 31, 2017
“Here is an exhausted bulb suspended from a single wire. Standing on an insulated support. I grasp it, and a platinum button mounted in it is brought to vivid incandescence. Here, attached to a leading wire, is another bulb, which, as I touch its metallic socket, is filled with magnificent colors of phosphorescent light.” - Tesla
I love how romantic Tesla sounded above, such passion, enthusiasm and love for the work he has done as an independent inventor. All I wish for is to feel the same level of love and passion about my work too.
Absolutely stunning book!!! Along with brilliant brain Tesla has a wonderful personality which is a rare quality to see among academics even in the present day!
I love how romantic Tesla sounded above, such passion, enthusiasm and love for the work he has done as an independent inventor. All I wish for is to feel the same level of love and passion about my work too.
Absolutely stunning book!!! Along with brilliant brain Tesla has a wonderful personality which is a rare quality to see among academics even in the present day!
March 2, 2013
I don't have the background to fully appreciate this book; nevertheless, I found it interesting. What I most enjoyed was Tesla's obvious enthusiasm for his subject and his research. I wish I could have watched this happen; it left me very curious about the demonstrations.
June 10, 2013
Shows the background of all of our modern conveniences and the scope of focus and interest Tesla had when experimenting with Alternating Current. For those vested heavily in electricity and electronics it is worth a read.
July 31, 2016
A fascinating window into the very beginning of electric engineering. Unfortunately, the diagrams which the author constantly references are not included in this Kindle edition. It is impossible to follow the details of the experiments discussed without them.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews